A recent study finds that Baby Boomers make up a smaller percentage of the IT workforce than many had thought. So what about all that turnover IT leaders have been worrying about?
I usually don’t pay much attention to what press releases deem to be big news, but this one got my attention.
Last month, I read a blog post by Susan Nunziata, the new editor in chief at CIO Insight, about the current makeup of the IT workforce. She cited a recent study from IT staffing firm Teksystems, which found that a whopping 73% of today’s IT workforce is under the age of 45.
The report—which polled nearly 1,000 IT leaders in the U.S. and Canada—broke down the current IT demographic as follows:
Silent Generation (born between 1922 – 1946): 1%
Baby Boomers (born between 1946 – 1964): 26%
Generation X (born between 1964 – 1980): 52%
Millennials, a.k.a. Generation Y (born between 1980 – 2000): 21%
I’ve heard so much about the upcoming mass retirement of the Baby Boomers, and the gaping holes that would create for IT organizations. Sure, some of that has to do with the fact that many older IT workers handle a lot of the older systems and technologies. That means CIOs need to find younger IT pros capable of filling that void.
Maybe people are simply mixing up the labels, putting Generation X pros into the Baby Boomer bucket. But maybe not.
Given these findings, do you have a different perspective on your staffing plans/strategies for the next few years?
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